Players demolish Trackmania's 'impossible' skip and fly over the finish line in reverse

Trackmania is one of those series that I've always enjoyed, while never quite being all-in. It's a distinctive and unusual driving experience, more 'gamey' in nature than most racers, and what's always been special about it is the community of racers it's fostered and kept playing. God do they take the minutiae of tracks seriously, with the most popular creations and ideas becoming both fiercely fought-over and collaborative undertakings.

It's one of these scenarios that has led to a track skip which, for over a decade of the series' existence, has been theorised about, but never achieved. Most thought it was impossible. The full story is told in this video by Wirtual, a longtime Trackmania community presence, who I've previously come across because he politely corrected some minor errors when I wrote an article on the game. Point is: this guy knows his Trackmania, and gives a comprehensive history of this particular skip, how the thinking on it changed over the years, and how it was finally achieved.

The track is called D07-Race, and one of the reasons for this skip being impossible is that, in certain older Trackmanias, it almost definitely is. But Trackmania Nations Forever and a resurgence of interest in racing on the track (which already had at least one famous time skip) saw certain players get interested in chasing the unicorn of this particular move: at first Drarker and then, building on their work, the player Hefest and then Rollin.

The 'impossible' skip in Trackmania Nations Forever.

(Image credit: Wirtual)

What is perhaps most remarkable about this skip, and it's something you see in speed-running all the time, is that it requires a high skill level to even get to the point where you can try to execute it: and then it's mostly down to luck. This skip revolves around the car gaining some air at the penultimate checkpoint and then crashing into the barrier in a way that sends the vehicle flying through the air and (in theory) over the finish line in reverse.

If you just want to see the successful run watch from here in Wirtual's video, but keep it running and you'll get a brief glimpse of the hundreds of cars that made that same lap and, at the end, didn't get the collision quite right.

This is the kind of sight that's simply spectacular to see, and in its collaborative nature a very Trackmania moment.

TOPICS
Rich Stanton
Senior Editor

Rich is a games journalist with 15 years' experience, beginning his career on Edge magazine before working for a wide range of outlets, including Ars Technica, Eurogamer, GamesRadar+, Gamespot, the Guardian, IGN, the New Statesman, Polygon, and Vice. He was the editor of Kotaku UK, the UK arm of Kotaku, for three years before joining PC Gamer. He is the author of a Brief History of Video Games, a full history of the medium, which the Midwest Book Review described as "[a] must-read for serious minded game historians and curious video game connoisseurs alike."

Read more
Tokyo Xtreme Racer
Tokyo Xtreme Racer brings heart, soul, and sweet handbrake turns back to the genre just when it needed them most
The Local gameplay
The Local is a free and blazingly-fast tribute to surf maps and bunny hopping
Pint, a lalafellin mage, looks towards the sunset sky and closes his eyes in gracious defeat in Final Fantasy 14.
FF14 streamer yields to the MMO's bounciest catgirl, after inspiring them to beat his new speedrunning record 3 times before he could finish making a video about it
The cover art for Majora's Mask showing Link and various other characters from the game.
I'm enraptured by this Zelda maniac who worked out there are 1 quadrillion 83 trillion 414 billion and 90 million possible permutations for a dog race in Majora's Mask
Crazy Taxi being speedrun with a live backing band
Speedrunning Crazy Taxi with a live band is an inventive way to dodge a DMCA takedown
A Blue car in front of a color splash on black background in Tokyo Xtreme Racer
I'm not even a car guy, but Y2K throwback Tokyo Xtreme Racer '25 looks incredible and has thousands of Overwhelmingly Positive Steam reviews after 4 days of early access
Latest in Racing
Victory screen of Big Rigs showing infamous "You're Winner" message under a three-handle gold trophy
One of the worst games ever made is coming to Steam, but we won't know how cruel this joke is until we see the price tag
Screenshot from Wreckfest 2
Wreckfest 2 has hit early access for your car-obliterating combat racing enjoyment
Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders
Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders is getting a new mountain next month and a whole bunch more throughout the year, including a game editor
A 1950s pickup truck smashes through a building while being cornered by a police car in Deliver At All Costs
Chaotic courier sim Deliver At All Costs will crash through your letterbox this May, and its latest trailer is even weirder than I expected
Sonic Racing CrossWorlds, showing various racing competitors hurtling through the air
Sonic Racing CrossWorlds looks like a return to the over-the-top arcade fun of All-Star Racing Transformed, and we'll get to play it this month
A masked sniper pointing his rifle in Nightmare Kart
Superb Bloodborne-inspired racing game Nightmare Kart is getting free DLC featuring sniper rifles and supercharged penny farthings
Latest in News
A mech awakens.
Mecha Break developer is considering unlocking all mechs following open beta feedback
Lara Croft Unified Art
Tomb Raider developer Crystal Dynamics lays off 17 employees 'to better align our current business needs and the studio's future success'
A long bendy arm stealing money from people in a subway car
'You're a very long arm. You steal things. It's a comedy game,' explains developer of comedy game where you steal things with a very long arm
The heroes are attacked by monsters
Pillars of Eternity is getting turn-based combat to mark its 10th anniversary, and that means PC Gamer editors will soon be arguing about combat mechanics again
Image of Ronaldo from Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves trailer
It doesn't really make sense that soccer star Ronaldo is now a Fatal Fury character, but if you follow the money you can see how it happened
Junah beginning a battle in Metaphor: ReFantazio.
Today's RPG fans are 'very sensitive to feeling like they wasted time' when they die, says Metaphor: ReFantazio battle planner—but Atlus still made combat hard anyway